Daiichi Sankyo files contempt plea in Delhi High Court; says SRL brand value is being diluted by debtors

The Delhi High Court recently asked Agilus Diagnostics Limited (formerly SRL Limited), SRL Diagnostics and Fortis Healthcare Limited to explain what steps they have taken to remove advertisements which allegedly diminish the value of the 'SRL Limited' brand.

Justice Yogesh Khanna passed the orders after a contempt plea was filed by Japanese pharmaceutical company Daiichi Sankyo stating that despite orders of the Court directing them not to diminish the value of brand, advertisements are being issued which have the effect doing the same.

One of the advertisements referred to in the plea stated, "SRL Diagnostics is now Agilus Diagnostics".

Counsel appearing for the respondents submitted that they have been taking steps since the Court’s orders to remove such advertisements, but since there are more than fifteen thousand physical hoardings, it is taking time. Further, the Court was informed that they have already removed almost all such hoardings barring a few ones which may have gone unnoticed.

He also said that they will place on record an affidavit stating all the steps they had been taking for removing such advertisements.

“Let such an affidavit be filed within three days from today with an advance copy to the learned counsel for the petitioner. Reply, if any, to such affidavit be filed within three days thereafter,” the Court ordered.

The case will now be considered on July 11.,

Daiichi Sankyo has been involved in a protracted legal battle over enforcement of an arbitral award passed in its favour by a Singapore tribunal in April 2016. The tribunal had awarded Daiichi Sankyo over ₹3,500 crore against former Religare promoters, including Malvinder and Shivinder Singh.

The SRL trademark was initially held by judgment debtor RHC Holding, owned by the Singh brothers. Daiichi had earlier sought a direction to sell SRL and its allied trademarks after the appointment of a court commissioner for the purpose of carrying out valuation.

In that matter, the Delhi High Court had passed a status quo order on July 8, 2020 to preserve the value of SRL brand.

However, now the respondents are attempting to subvert the attachment of the SRL brand/mark and are transferring the goodwill and value amassed by the ‘SRL’ brand over decades into a new ‘Agilus’ brand, thereby leaving SRL with no objective value or goodwill, Daiichi stated.

Senior Advocates Arun Kathpalia and Arvind Nayyar along with Advocates Amit Mishra, Samridhi Hota, Varad Choudhary, Astha Ahuja, Shyra Hoon, Kunal Chatterji and Diksha Gupta appeared for Daiichi Sankyo.

Senior Advocates Rajiv Nayyar and Abhinav Vashisht with Advocates Sanjeev Sharma, Vaibhav Kakkar, Sahil Arora, Sanya Sud, Manjira Dasgupta, Vaishali Goyal, Akshita Sachdeva, Siddharth Jain and Aditya Dewan appeared for the respondents.

[Read Order]